Emerald Cities Collaborative Bloghttp://emeraldcities.org/
en-usCopyright Emerald Cities Collaborative.Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 -0500http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rssHiFiadmin@emeraldcities.orgadmin@emeraldcities.orgThe Kresge Foundation Funds Anchor Institution Resilience Strategyhttp://emeraldcities.org/media/news/500k-kresge-foundation-grant-will-build-community-resilience-to-climate-change-through-collaboration-with-anchor-institutions
ECC has received a $500,000, two-year planning and development grant from The Kresge Foundation to collaborate with anchor institutions and other partners on a Community and Energy Resilience Initiative (CERI) in three low-income coastal communities at risk of climate change: East Oakland/Richmond, Calif., the Bronx, N.Y., and Miami, Fla. (The initiative is also known as Anchors for Resilient Communities, or ARC.)

The anchor institutions – major local nonprofit, public and private institutions including hospitals and community colleges – will act as catalysts in strengthening the physical, social and economic resilience of their surrounding urban communities.

“Anchor Institutionsare thecenterpieces and catalysts for building stronger local economies and climate-resilient infrastructure,” said ECC President and CEO Denise Fairchild. “CERI will engage the health mission and economic power of hospitals and other anchor partners to plan, promote and implement community-wide resilience initiatives.”

Key to CERI are:

Food and energy resilience, which are drivers for mitigating and adapting to climate change;

Economic resilience designed to harnesses the procurement, investment and economic power of ECC’s institutional partners to build more resilient local business and community capacities; and

Equity/community engagement – each site has a robust, pre-existing community engagement component that ensures the inclusion of low-income communities of color in resilience planning and implementation.

The proposed scope of work includes:

Multi-stakeholder collaboratives dedicated to planning and developing resilient community and energy infrastructure;

Climate resilience education and training for institutional and community partners and health workers;

Resilience planning, including climate risk analyses, asset mapping, gap analyses and an infrastructure investment program for one of the target communities, East Oakland/Richmond;

Anchor institution investment plans and strategies to mitigate the causes and consequences of climate change; and

Dissemination of multiple frameworks, tools and approaches for engaging anchor institutions in community and energy resilience planning and implementation.

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Tue, 31 Mar 2015 10:25:00 -0400http://emeraldcities.org/media/news/500k-kresge-foundation-grant-will-build-community-resilience-to-climate-change-through-collaboration-with-anchor-institutionsHiFiConservative Groups in Florida Back Community Energy!http://emeraldcities.org/media/news/conservative-groups-in-florida-back-community-energy
Who would have thought that a group with “Tea Party” in the name would be among those backing an effort to make solar energy more accessible?

According to Climate Progress (an outlet of the progressive Center for American Progress), the Tea Party Network is among the diverse groups supporting the "pro-solar conservative Floridians for Solar Choice" in seeking a ballot initiative that would allow Florida consumers to purchase solar power directly from each other.

The Tampa Bay Times explains that the initiative would permit “business or property owners to produce up to two megawatts of solar power and sell it directly to others, such as tenants, without having to go through a utility.”

Strange BedfellowsAdditional supporters of the measure include the Solar Energy Industries Association, Sierra Club, Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, Christian Coalition, Greenpeace, the Florida Retail Federation and Physicians for Social Responsibility, according to the two news outlets.

They report that Floridians for Solar Choice has obtained sufficient signatures to allow the Florida Supreme Court to review the petition and determine if its language legally qualifies it to be a 2016 ballot initiative. But a hurdle remains: The group must secure 683,149 signatures from at least seven congressional districts by February 1 to get on the ballot.

The proposed ballot initiative summary states that it “Limits or prevents government and electric utility imposed barriers to supplying local solar electricity” such as “government regulation of local solar electricity suppliers’ rates, service and territory, and unfavorable electric utility rates, charges, or terms of service imposed on local solar electricity customers.”

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Mon, 30 Mar 2015 09:56:32 -0400http://emeraldcities.org/media/news/conservative-groups-in-florida-back-community-energyHiFiECC Endorses Resource Value Frameworkhttp://emeraldcities.org/media/news/ecc-endorses-resource-value-framework
The ECC board has endorsed the Resource Value Framework (RVF), a set of principles for evaluating the cost-effectiveness of utility ratepayer-funded electricity and natural gas energy efficiency resources. From ECC’s perspective, a key plus is that the RVF allows for consideration of non-energy benefits – such as health and safety and the hiring of disadvantaged workers – in the cost-effectiveness calculations for energy efficiency programs.

The RVF was developed by the National Efficiency Screening Project (NESP), a group of organizations and individuals working to improve the way such energy efficiency programs are screened for cost-effectiveness, as well as to advise decision makers on which efficiency resources are in the public interest and what level of investment is appropriate. The NESP is coordinated by the Home Performance Coalition and has more than 30 members. Endorsing the RVF confers membership in NESP.

Customer-funded energy efficiency programs have generated tens of billions of dollars of savings for households and businesses throughout the nation by reducing energy bills of program participants by deferring the need for new power plants, reducing marginal energy costs, avoiding transmission and distribution costs, reducing risk on the utility system and helping achieve key energy policy goals. More than $7 billion is spent every year on ratepayer energy efficiency programs.

States have a tremendous opportunity to expand upon these benefits through ongoing and future energy efficiency initiatives, but to take full advantage of this opportunity, many states need to revisit and update their cost effectiveness screening methods and practices.

The book is aimed at those who lead, govern and support what Grant calls “social profit organizations” – his preferred alternative to “nonprofits.” It offers them “a better way to understand and communicate the point of our work,” management consultant and author Susan Kenny Stevens says in the forward.

For GreenFaith, a faith-based environmental organization, the rubric was a steppingstone to creation of the nation's first interfaith environmental certification program, for example.

In the chapter on Rubrics for Sustainability, ECC President and CEO Denise Fairchild describes how using the rubric has helped ECC advance its goals: “The rubric helps us to organize our work and our coalitions within and across our local sites…[It] gives us greater capacity, locally and nationally, to find the right points of leverage for the transformation we seek, and it will enhance our ability to muster the right tools and resources to achieve it.”

Fairchild adds that using the rubric has clarified the strategic importance of ECC’s local policy work in areas such as utility reform and carbon reduction legislation as a complement to ECC projects in energy efficiency retrofits of public, institutional and multi-family buildings.

Copies of The Social Profit Handbook are available for purchase from a number of sources, including Amazon (type in title) and Chelsea Green Publishing, which offers bulk discounts on orders of more than 10 copies (contact Darrell Koerner at DKoerner@chelseagreen.com).

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Thu, 26 Mar 2015 12:17:07 -0400http://emeraldcities.org/media/news/social-profit-handbook-highlights-ecc-rubric-for-creating-sustainability-impactHiFiMajor Funders Join Enviro Groups in Sharing Diversity Datahttp://emeraldcities.org/media/news/major-funders-join-enviro-groups-in-sharing-diversity-data
Building on its December announcement in Washington, D.C., that six major U.S. environmental organizations would soon begin reporting diversity data, Green 2.0 has now announced that five top U.S. funders of environmental work will follow suit. To date, nearly 60 environmental nonprofits have submitted or pledged to submit diversity data by April 2015.

At its “Breaking the Green Ceiling” forum in San Francisco earlier this month, Green 2.0 announced that by April, the Bullitt, Hewlett and Kresge Foundations, the Meyer Memorial Trust and the Rockefeller Brothers Fund will include diversity data in their profiles on Guide Star, an online database of nonprofit organizations.

The earlier announcement came in the wake of Green 2.0’s publication of The State of Diversity in Environmental Organizations, which concluded that a “green ceiling” has led to under-representation of people of color on boards of directors and in staff leadership positions at mainstream environment groups, as well as at the foundations that support them and at government agencies.

‘Green Ceiling’ Hinders Up to 88 Percent

The report said “although people of color now account for more than a third of the U.S. population, they have on average not broken the 12-16 percent ‘green ceiling’” at the nearly 300 entities surveyed.

“Submitting data to GuideStar allows us to establish an important baseline to measure diversity efforts,” said Green 2.0 founder Robert Raben.

New America Media, which helped organize the San Francisco forum, reported that Green 2.0 Director Danielle Deane told attendees that foundations and nonprofits “acknowledge that diversity is important to make a difference,” but their efforts in that direction have been “lackluster.”

Peggy Saika, president and executive director of Asian Americans/Pacific Islanders in Philanthropy, commented, “The question for us is, ‘Who makes decisions?’ People and communities that are most impacted by those decisions must not only lead on those issues, but they must be actively participating.”

Diversity Dividend

In an opinion piece for the Chronicle of Philanthropy, Raben and Robert Ross, chief executive of the California Endowment and co-chair of the D5 Coalition of foundations seeking to advance diversity and equity in philanthropy, observed:

“Latinos and blacks routinely tell pollsters they strongly support efforts to promote clean air and water and measures to fend off climate change…That should come as no surprise, since the health consequences of environmental disasters fall hardest on communities of color. With leaders at the helm who have expertise in reaching those communities, the environmental movement could experience a dramatic boost.

“The lack of diverse faces on environmental boards and in executive leadership means a missed opportunity to build alliances with influential organizations already run by leaders of color. These are the people who know how to conduct environmental outreach in their communities and bring a wealth of knowledge to the green nonprofits.

“It is the responsibility of foundation leaders to adopt the best hiring practices,” they continued, adding that a recent McKinsey & Company study showed “companies with women and people of color in their management produced stronger financial results than those that did not.”

They concluded by asking, “If there is a ‘diversity dividend’ for corporate America, why can’t there be one for foundations and nonprofits?”

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Thu, 26 Mar 2015 12:03:07 -0400http://emeraldcities.org/media/news/major-funders-join-enviro-groups-in-sharing-diversity-dataHiFiSens. Portman, Shaheen Persevere on Bipartisan Energy Efficiency Policyhttp://emeraldcities.org/media/news/sens-portman-shaheen-persevere-on-bipartisan-energy-efficiency-policy
It took three years of work and a 4 a.m. vote by just two senators, cosponsors Rob Portman (R-Ohio) and Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), for the U.S. Senate to pass a stand-alone, bipartisan energy efficiency bill. Their long-awaited triumphant moment came after what what Politico called an "overnight budget vote-o-rama." With the House of Representatives working on a companion bill, it's possible that energy efficiency legislation could be enacted this year.

The 2015 version of their Energy Savings and Industrial Competitiveness Act (ESIC) would reduce energy use in many sectors of the U.S. economy, including low-income housing, commercial buildings, the federal government – the nation’s single largest energy user – schools and manufacturing.

Housing Provisions

Based on an amendment originally introduced by Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), the bill would authorize the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to undertake energy and water efficiency upgrades to HUD-assisted multi-family housing. A provision in President Obama’s FY 2016 budget request includes a provision authorizing HUD to facilitate financing of such efficiency projects.

ESIC also requires federal mortgage agencies to include energy efficiency in determining a home’s value and affordability.

In the manufacturing area, the bill expands the definition of energy service provider to include companies that improve water efficiency. The bill also includes provisions that would improve energy efficiency in federal buildings and data centers.

Overall, the bill incentivizes the use of efficiency technologies that:

Are commercially available today;

Can be widely deployed across the country; and

Quickly pay for themselves through energy savings.

Bipartisan Appeal

In a joint statement, the co-sponsors say their deficit-neutral bill is widely supported on both sides of the political aisle, as well as by industry leaders, energy efficiency advocates and environmental stakeholders.

“Energy efficiency is the cheapest and fastest way to address our energy challenges,” said Shaheen. The bill would “create jobs, save consumers billions and drastically reduce pollution in a smart, effective and affordable way,” she continued.

“Our bill is the equivalent of taking 37 million homes off the grid,” Portman added.

Savings Quantified

The senators’ statement quoted a study by the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy, an ECC board member, estimating that ESIC would, by 2030:

Create more than 190,000 jobs;

Save consumers $16.2 billion a year; and

Cut CO2 emissions and other air pollutants by the equivalent of taking 22 million cars off the road.

According to the Alliance to Save Energy, the avoided CO2 would amount to 95 million metric tons a year. The Alliance says the bill would also:

Create a national strategy to increase the use of energy efficiency through a model building energy code;

Promote development of energy efficient supply chains for companies; and

ECC is pleased to announce that its board of directors elected two new members at its March 12 board meeting and approved a change in status for one continuing member.

Having moved to a new job from the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE), Eric Mackres will continue to serve on ECC’s board as a subject matter expert. He isnow with the World Resources Institute’s (WRI) Ross Center for Sustainable Cities focused on their new Building Efficiency Initiative, working primarily with cities in rapidly developing countries that are expanding their efficiency efforts.

Mackres adds a new international perspective to ECC’s work, along withhis expertise in local and community energy programs; community and economic development planning; non-energy benefits of energy efficiency; and social and behavioral aspects of energy efficiency.

Lauren Ross is the new board member representing ACEEE. She serves as that organization’s senior analyst and local policy lead, conducting research, policy analysis and outreach supporting the intersection of affordable housing, energy efficiency and sustainable urban development.

Ross hopes to complete a Ph.D. in sociology from Temple University in May and currently teaches in the Department of Sociology at George Washington University.

Prior to joining ACEEE, Ross was a fellow with the Office of International and Philanthropic Innovation, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development; a research assistant for the National Low-Income Housing Coalition; and a research assistant at the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies. She also held research positions with George Washington University and the University of Delaware’s Disaster Research Center.

Her expertise includes helping communities adopt policies that finance affordable housing, change land use policy to better support mixed-income housing development and advance fair housing practices. Rose is also a community leader in the Bay Area on educational equity issues and created the PolicyLink Equitable Development Toolkit, an online resource that highlights best social equity practices.

From 2005 until 2010 Rose led the organization’s Gulf Coast recovery work to shape a more equitable post-Katrina rebuilding of New Orleans and Louisiana.

Rose’s previous experience includes many years of work with rural indigenous communities on economic development and cultural continuity, as well as more than a decade of expertise in social change philanthropy, supporting economic justice, community organizing and civil rights.

Staff Changes

Felipe Floresca, who joined ECC as a senior policy advisor, is now ECC’s fulltime vice president, policy and government affairs, on the national staff. He will continue to guide ECC’s national, state and local policy advocacy work.

Two of ECC’s local directors are moving on to new jobs – but continuing to work in the sustainability arena.

Former EC Cleveland Local Director Shanelle Smith has become the first deputy director of sustainability with Cuyahoga County’s new Department of Sustainability, serving as second in command to inaugural Director Mike Foley, a former state representative and EC Cleveland Local Council member.

At the department’s February 3 launch event, Cuyahoga County Executive Armond Budish said the county will actively collaborate with local businesses, schools, nonprofits and other local governments “to grow ‘green jobs,’ institutionalize environmentally-sound best practices and, ultimately, minimize Cuyahoga County’s carbon footprint.” The department will also promote economic development to support businesses that provide environmentally-sustainable goods and services and educate the public about environmentally-sustainable practices.

As head of EC Cleveland since August 2010, Smith was instrumental in establishing the county’s new sustainability office and in institutionalizing ECC’s principles, values and strategies in the department’s design. She worked on building consensus among diverse community and civic leaders around the goals of sustainable economic development and creation of jobs in green building for disadvantaged county residents.

As of April, Casey Barnard, EC Portland’s project director since 2011, will lead WorkSystems, Inc.'s ReBoot Program, focused on connecting veterans and long-term unemployed workers to IT and manufacturing careers. At Emerald Cities, Casey served coalition partners as a convener, facilitator and project manager and helped lead efforts to develop and implement a Community Benefits Agreement (CBA) with the City of Portland. The CBA has been groundbreaking in its inclusion of community and equity stakeholders as well as in dedicating funds for outreach, training, contractor technical assistance and compliance. Casey plans to continue supporting Emerald Cities' efforts in Portland and beyond and will remain the primary EC Portland contact during the transition.

The order calls for a 40 percent reduction in GHG below 2008 levels over the next decade, saving taxpayers up to $18 billion in avoided energy costs. It also increases to 30 percent the share of electricity that the federal government consumes from renewable sources.

According to the Associated Press, today’s executive order calls for the federal government to:

Cut energy use in federal buildings 2.5 percent yearly between 2015 and 2025;

Ensure that federal agencies are getting 25 percent of their heat and electricity from clean sources by 2025; and

Increase the number of hybrid and zero-emission vehicles in the federal car and truck fleet.

Supplier CommitmentsComplementing the public-sector effort, several major federal suppliers will join a White House roundtable today to discuss their own actions to cut GHG emissions, some making their first corporate commitments to disclose emissions and set new reduction goals, according to a White House statement. Each company does in excess of $1 billion a year in business with the U.S. government.

The federal government’s actions and the new supplier commitments together will reduce GHG emissions by 26 million metric tons by 2025 from 2008 levels, the equivalent of taking almost 5.5 million cars off the road for a year.

Given that the federal government is the country’s single largest energy consumer, federal emissions reductions and progress across the supply chain will have broad impacts, the White House said.

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Thu, 19 Mar 2015 10:57:11 -0400http://emeraldcities.org/media/news/executive-order-cuts-federal-governments-ghg-emissions-boosts-clean-energy-useHiFiObama Budget Proposes Energy Conservation Pilot in 20,000 Multifamily Assisted Housing Unitshttp://emeraldcities.org/media/news/obama-budget-proposes-energy-conservation-pilot-in-20000-multifamily-assisted-housing-units
The president’s FY 2016 budget request includes a three-year pilot project to reduce energy and water utility costs in up to 20,000 assisted multifamily housing units. The Multifamily Performance-Based Energy Conservation Demonstration would allow the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to facilitate financing of energy and water conservation improvements in such housing units, with the intent of reducing utility costs. The demonstration program would run through FY 2018, with the term for payments lasting up to 12 years.

The projects are to be budget-neutral, with the HUD-subsidized utility costs and the performance payments not exceeding the subsidized utility costs in the absence of the energy- and water-saving measures. Payments are to be contingent upon realized utility cost savings.

According to the San Francisco-based National Housing Law Project (NHLP), Project-Based Section 8 Rental Assistance funds could be used to support the demonstration’s energy and water conservation improvements. NHLP notes that by “expressly authorizing subsidy funds to be shared with owners to support energy-saving investments, this proposal should further the process of unlocking the split incentive problem in HUD-supported affordable properties (where owners pay for energy investments but tenants pay the bills and get the benefits).”

This year-long leadership development program and local engagement strategy will catalyze support for universal national service in communities across the

country by recruiting up to 50 emerging leaders ages 28-45 from up to 35 communities across the country to take part.

Beginning in June with an all-expenses-paid seminar and training in Washington, D.C., Ambassadors will return to their home communities empowered to expand service year opportunities and inspire to engager in national service.

Successful candidates will have demonstrated community connections, convening power and a commitment to national service. Although the project is targeting spe